


Still and Severe

by orphan_account



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Godswood, Heart Tree, Old Gods, Post-War, Weirwood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-10
Updated: 2013-01-10
Packaged: 2017-11-24 09:11:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/632765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world was quiet, and vast, or so it seemed to be in the godswood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Still and Severe

The world was quiet, and vast, _or so it seemed to be in the godswood_. Sansa hadn't been here for a good many years, since before the war, before Joffrey, _before the dirge of the Starks._ There was something humbling, cold and crisp hanging in the air; _every breath was frigid, like ice in-between her ribs_. This had been her lord-father's sanctuary, where he'd seek refuge from promises, sins, and Lannisters, she had never seen the allure, _before now_.

The pond was still, she could remember being frightened of it as a child, _it had been so dark and bottomless_ and as a young girl that had frightened her, now as a woman it was a bitter comfort. Letting out a breath that could have been a cloud, Sansa grinned, _'seems that some things can still be infinite and limitless.'_

As a red leaf fell from the Heart Tree, she hummed a dirge between breaths, _'perhaps limitless was a romanticized word for life?'_

Gooseflesh littered her limbs, as the leaves littered the floor of the godswood, _a lifetime ago she might've found it annoying rather than reassuring, but she'd been a different girl then._ The life surrounding her was slow, _seemingly inanimate and dead,_ but it had changed since she'd last prayed her with her lord-father. She could recall it well, not perfectly though, time and tragedy had bled into most of her memories that involved her family, _in particularly the ones that had occurred at Winterfell before everything._

Sansa and Lord Eddard had knelt before the white tree, and he had closed his eyes and muttered words to the silence of it all, Sansa however had stared into the face. It had been long and passively sad, with eyes that were red with the hardened red sap of the Heart Tree.

Gazing at it now, Sansa noticed something that she had not when she had studied it all those years ago. _The face was not the face of God, old or the new_ , but rather that of her father, Lord Eddard of House Stark, Ned. His grey eyes were carved deeply and severely into the tree and were obscured only by the red sap, _the colour of Sansa's hair, of her mother's hair, of all the Stark blood shed in the war._ Sansa sighed, _'were those the tears we had cried for him, or the tears he cried for us who were left behind?'_

She didn't know if his features were sad due to the way his life had turned out, or if he was sad for the way Sansa's had, but his frown looked softer than it had all those years ago. _'Perhaps father had missed me, as I did him?'_

Rising to her feet with all the poise she could muster, she shuffled over to him. Sansa raised her right hand _and brushed the tears from his eyes, as she wiped at hers with her left._ Sagging gently against him, and slumping down to sit with her back leaning against him, she smiled.

The sky overhead was Stark grey and limitless, a lovely contradiction and she could blurrily see carrion birds circling above her. Whilst her father wept fat red tears at her back, Sansa's wound wept in the front. The arrow was through her ribs and blood leaked slowly from it.

The world was quiet, and vast, or so it seemed to be within the godswood. Sansa hadn't be there for a good many years, and now she would never have to leave. The pool was still, dark, bottomless, and red, and so was Sansa. As a cool breeze threaded its way through the weirwood leaves, Sansa could feel her frayed heartstrings sewing her heart back together, as her wound ripped her body apart.

_The world was dark and Sansa could feel nothing more than the cold and her father's gentle embrace._


End file.
